Regardless of your position in life, the majority of humans adore music, even some to psychotic levels. With that in mind, we asked our staff, who’s feeding your addiction? Where do you go to get your fix?

Who’s Your Dealer

Brian Rutherford

While Napster’s merely an after-thought, we certainly owe them for the pure freedom’s listeners enoy in streaming music. Even with a consistent but sometimes unsolicited source of music one click away from my inbox, like most, I enjoy the most effortless and immediate libraries of today’s music landscape. Pandora annoys me for the most part and the recently released Apple Music has left me hesitant at best before even trying. Youtube has been and always will be my right-hand man and back-up plan like most, but for multiple hours of entertainment, Spotify’s simplicity and offline playlist downloading has made its service worthy of the industry’s higher-end premium.

Carlita

When it comes to how I consume music, I utilize several sources and will not part with any of them. There are so many choices out there, music needs to be available on all platforms. Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, Soundcloud, Shazam, iHeartRadio, Vevo, Noisetrade and GooglePlay are my favorites. If I like what I hear there or at a show, I will buy the music directly. I follow some great knowledgeable music lovers (artists, producers, fans) of different ages and genres on social networks who’ve shared dope music with me via TLs as well. Exchange of music is a beautiful thing.

Nick Fry

Being the sort of person who feels that I do not possess music unless I can physically handle it (I grew up when 12”vinyl was king), digital music and streaming is not the same to me. But, of course, I do use these formats, but perhaps not in the way that others may.I use Spotify solely to check out something I want to listen to. If I like it, I will buy it in a physical format. If not, I move on. If I can’t find it on Spotify I try YouTube, with the same end.

I do download music, but never pay for it. Illegal? I think not. Most of it I already own on vinyl so as far as I am concerned that is fair use. As for the rest, well I want a physical copy of it, but either the vinyl or the CD is long deleted. I hunt for second hand copies of course, but if record companies don’t want my money sufficiently to re-release an album, then they are not in a position to say I cannot download it if I can find it (and that is often a big if!). So three cheers for Cherry Red, Renascent and Rhino who make a habit of tracking down long lost bands from the eighties and nineties and re-releasing their material. If not for them, my musical world would be a much darker place.”

Brought to you by Statista, while a fair assumption, here is a breakdown of streaming service usage by age group.

Maddy Johnson

When I’m at home I love listening to vinyl. I enjoy the smooth analogue and the serenity of listening to a single album. Apart from that, I use iTunes. I like the freedom of being able to put music on my iPod and listen to my music on the go, especially at the gym when I need to block out terrible pump-up music. iTunes also allows me to pay by the song instead of for the whole album. I prefer paying for music in order to support the artists I enjoy and the industry they depend on.

Kevin Sellers

Spotify
This has fast become my favorite tool for listening my own favorites and finding new artists. Easy to use and especially friendly to desktop dinosaurs like myself. Premium is worth the money, as well.

Word of mouth
This mostly means Facebook posts from friends and record labels/bands’ pages. If you manage your Facebook alerts carefully this is a great tool.

PR firms
As part of the staff at Music Emissions, I am lucky to have access to numerous firms and even specific labels that offer promotional copies of music for advanced review. The amount of bands I’ve found and enjoyed in this way is impossible to calculate. Basically, if you have some free time and an urge to voice opinions on music, this is a great side project to get into.